Bank of America Launches Next Gen Banking Centers

The bank announced the opening of five "express banking centers," which specialize in self-service technology.

Bank of America has announced the launch of five additional "express banking centers" dedicated to offering self-service technology to handle services and common transactions in Boston, Charlotte and New York City.

The express sites will include associates to handle customers’ questions, open new accounts and guide the self-service banking options.

“With the addition of express centers, our retail business offers customers more flexibility and convenience,” said Katy Knox, retail banking and distribution executive at Bank of America. “Today our franchise combines our advanced ATM technology, online and mobile Banking, and banking centers with the personal assistance from our associates and specialists to enable customers to bank how and when they want.”

The banking center also includes ATMs with "Teller Assist," which allows customer to speak with a teller to receive personal assistance. U.S.-based tellers will be able to assist with cash withdrawals, cashing checks, depositing checks with cash back, and make loan or credit card payments in English or Spanish.

Zarna Patel is a staff writer for InformationWeek's Financial Services brands, which include Bank Systems & Technology, Insurance & Technology and Wall Street & Technology. She received her B.A. in English and journalism from Rutgers University College of Arts and Sciences in ... View Full Bio

I recently heard a report claiming that, at least at supermarkets, self-checkout does NOT save any time and that human checkout workers are faster, more accurate & efficient. So maybe the future is a robot that will handle checkout.

Branch roles actually are far from fixed (although the fact that you think they are suggests either that banks are doing a poor job of communicating the channel shifts, or that you are primarily using other channels and not engaged with branch/ATM). We are hearing that branches are going to evolve into more informational/educational, versus transactional, facilities, although I think this is still in very early stages. What is true is that after a decade or more of branch expansion -- driven because nothing had effectively replaced the branch as a source of revenues -- there is now indisputable evidence that consumer behavior truly is shifting. As for ATMs -- to be honest, banks have tried for years with unsatisfying results to have ATMs be more than cash dispensers -- use for dispensing everything from stamps to movie tickets. They do a couple of specific things very well, and until a mobile device is able to spew out cash, I don't think they'll be going away.

There's a not insignificant amount of times that I'm in a regular checkout line and a second cashier or manager has to assist who's there, too. Same thing happens in the bank with tellers consulting each other. Automating the simplest processes (like the grocery scanning) and training staff to deal with corner cases or advanced processes (like determining the sale price of an item) can benefit a lot of industries.

In my mind the role of a banking branch and ATM is fixed, so it's interesting to learn how they plan to evolve the technology and service. August 2014 is a ways off, but I'll mark my calendar, I'm interested to see what the "experience" is like, and if that will be enough to retain or win over new customers.

The teller assist functionality is something that banks have been talking about for a while. Some smaller banks have piloted the technology with mixed results. Some customers love it, others don't. It will be interesting to see how BofA's customers respond to the technology (especially at BofA's scale).